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SEIMER1234

And, breathe.

Yes, after a long tough term, and an even tougher week of campaigning, the Eleventh General Election is over, and the result are known. Yes, coalition building is going on as I write, and the dawn looks set to break on another fresh new term. How exciting.

However, I take this time to pause and reflect, on the shoddy state of liberalism in the UK at the moment, and what we as libertarians must do to prevent the same happening to our ideology and party.

Firstly, we must look at what happened to the liberal parties. They lost a collective 5 seats this election, and the Lib Dems are now the 4th largest party in the country, behind the Tories, Labour and LPUK. The classical liberals remain the 5th largest.

For two parties that after the last GE formed a government, this is a damning inditement of what has been, in many eyes, a term marked by chaos, confusion and broken promises from the two parties. The Liberal Democrats broken promises did not largely come from their time in government, yes most certainly they had government policies that conflicted with their election promises however these did not amount to a true betrayal of their ideology. Instead, the Liberal Democrats threw their supposed “liberalism” out the door, by joining the TLC opposition made up of far left, avowedly socialist parties. The Liberal Democrats threw their vision of a liberal Britain out the door once it because politically beneficial. And then, we have the Classical Liberals, whose betrayal is much clearer to see. The broken promise that perhaps defined the failed Liberal government was their u-turn on another referendum. It was a U-turn that would haunt them, and, some would argue, be the downfall of their government.  The Classical Liberals all too often looked like they had been taken captive, with a leadership that stayed silent when Liberal Democrats pursued illiberal left-wing policies, perhaps best illustrated by PM Wagbo’s anti-nuclear weapons sentiments displayed on Twitter. While this did lead to backlash on the Classical Liberal back-benches when I myself tweeted asking Twisted to state his opinion on Wagbos comment I received radio silence. For far, far too often, the Classical Liberals abandoned their principles to appease a Liberal Democrat party that knew full well, in this supposed “coalition of equals”, one party was much more equal than the other.

However, that is not the reason I am writing this article. I am not writing this article to outline the flaws of the liberal parties. I am writing this op-ed to warn my own party of what happens when we abandon our values. While I still believe, I truly do, that the ideology and policies of the LPUK are the same now as it was when I joined, I too was unable to ignore the sensationalist, extreme campaign and twitter antics that we saw over the general election. It’s clear to me that there was a change in our rhetoric during the general election, a change for the worse. It’s a change which to far too many has confirmed their view of our party as far right. The LPUK can not abandon our values of personal and economic freedom, and we can not allow our rhetoric to mirror that of the far right.

If history has thought us anything, it’s that a party abandoning its values leads to electoral oblivion. The LPUK must heed that lesson. The LPUK must continue to offer a socially and economically libertarian vision for the United Kingdom’s future, in the same way, the Liberal Democrats and Classical Liberals must offer a socially and economically liberal vision. Our nation can not slip back into a two-party system of Tories vs Labour. Our discourse needs a liberal and libertarian alternative to the ideologies of the establishment parties. The LPUK, Lib Dems and Classical Liberals must dare ourselves to do better and to stand up bravely for the ideals we are elected on.

This piece was written for The Daily Telegraph by seimer1234 MP as an opinion editorial. The views expressed are not necessarily representative of those of The Model Telegraph Media Group, its editors or its proprietors. The MTMG thanks semier1234 for his opinion editorial.

Seimer1234 is the President of the Libertarian Party UK and the incumbent MP for Buckinghamshire.

LECHEVALIERMAL-FAIT

Let me begin by saying that joining one of Britain’s established political parties is unequivocally anathema to offering something new – kwilson has obviously engaged in something fishy. So while under the rules of our electoral system he owns the seat and may do what he pleases with it, at the very least he has completely failed to inform voters in Kent and the South East that this was an option he was open to. And this humble writer believes that the decent thing now would be to offer the people of the South East a chance to now that he has switched parties to pass their verdict on that.

However Mr Wilson’s actions are far from the only fishy part to this tail, the guts of the story are the strange decision by all three TLC parties to fail to stand in Kent and endorse instead a former LPUK and short-lived Tory. This curious decision, that they now reject, deserves attention in its own right. The petition that is going around casts Something New!’s Manifesto as centre-left and and appears to be trying to establish a narrative where by Mr Wilson was feigning left of centre credentials obtained endorsements and quickly went back in his word.

A number of points in response to this: firstly, even if it did happen as is suggested in this narrative those responsible for deciding to endorse Something New! clearly did a poor job by failing to take into account Mr Wilson’s wider record and failed to anticipate how that might lead to a defection to a right of centre party. His diverse political history should have been enough to raise some question and indeed in his very first tweet since returning to politics Mr Wilson states that he wanted to rebuild bridges with the LPUK and followed this up by announcing his decision to run in Hampshire – which is a Green-Tory marginal.

Further the strange decision to attempt to cast the Something New! manifesto as centre left is bizarre and, for self proclaimed leftists, reflects a worrying lack of knowledge of their own ideology. An honest assessment is that Mr Wilson is libertarian and anti authoritarian. Where there is overlap with the progressive left, it is because the left embraces anti authoritarianism. But there is explicit disagreement with the left on a range of subjects from tax to foreign policy. In summation I wouldn’t ascribe leftness or rightness to the document, it is at its core anti authority.

So if the TLC is not guilty of gross incompetence in endorsing Mr Wilson then what might have happened? Indeed, knowing many of the members of the TLC leadership to not be complete incompetents (only partial), can we explain firstly why Something New! very quickly decided to not run in Hampshire South, as initially stated, and instead in Kent and secondly what the TLC’s wider goals in this were in this.

Anonymous sources within the TLC and published in The Daily Telegraph (10th Feb) reported a conversation on a similar topic where the TLC was deciding to endorse DF44 in Lancashire South and where the former PM Wagbo is reported to have said, “We probably don’t have a better candidate” and that “it will tie up Tory resources”. With Kent being a much safer Tory seat than Lanc South – indeed the safest in the nation if constituency polls are accurate – then it is even less likely that the TLC would be able to field a strong candidate there, but nevertheless hoping to gain electoral advantage from the return to politics of Mr Wilson. The TLC concluded by a similar logic that they could gain national advantage for the TLC by tying up a Tory Deputy Leader in a local fight instead of campaigning nationally.

By offering Mr Wilson endorsements in Kent but not in Hampshire South (a Green Tory marginal) to induce him to run there instead of Hampshire South with LPUK support as I theorise he initially planned to from his tweets. Where in a calculated move he publicly declares he is running, offers an olive branch to the LPUK and has chosen a seat where no LPUK candidate is likely to stand. I theorise his plans only subsequently changed once he failed to receive an endorsement from the LPUK (who had already come to an arrangement with the Tories) and was instead offered the opportunity of TLC endorsements in Kent.

There was certainly some political advantage to be gained by the TLC whether or not Something New! won as I have already discussed. So it appears that they are not the entirely naive and innocent bystanders who have been taken advantage of as they might wish you to believe. And further to this line of thought a Something New! Victory on the list may well have come at the expense of an LPUK or Tory seat, and surely this is the political calculation that high ranking members of the TLC anticipated would result by endorsing him, anything less would simply be incompetence.

If the TLC are unhappy with the decision of Kwilson to change parties they should reject any benefit that they derived from the tying down a senior Tory. Thus if they are purely motivated by a non partisan desire for fairness then they should also put to a by-election any seat where a visit by a less busy Tory DL might have tipped the balance. I eagerly await yet another by-election bonanza.

But all of this is simply conjecture based on a limited snapshot of incentives, public statements and private conservations reported on by The Telegraph. All we can say for sure is that there was Something very Fishy went on…

LeChevalierMal-Fait is the Conservative MP for Essex and is writing in a personal capacity.

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The newly elected List MP for the South East, kwilson92, released an Open Letter this evening. In his statement, kwilson revealed the contents of his so-called “deal” with the LPUK, after he joined the party on Sunday.

The MP ran on a campaign under the “Something New!” banner against the Chancellor ToastinRussian in Kent, however, after winning his list seat in the SE region, he joined the Libertarian Party.

In the past kwilson has stood in Buckinghamshire (against seimer, with whom he is now a fellow partyman) and Kent.

The deal with Friedmanite19, the leader of the right wing party, involved kwilson becoming head of the LPUK’s newly reanimated Northern Irish party, called the New Unionist Party of Northern Ireland.

Kwilson also state he “will not be resigning until [he is] ready and not a moment before.”

However, this raises more questions than it answers.

Immediately after the letter was released, some Liberal MPs demanded he call a by election, and even resign.

Kwilson told the Telegraph that “I have said many times, that i will not rule out a by election but i will do it on my terms.”, practically ruling out a by election in the near future.

Tommy1boys, the Classical Liberal Deputy Leader, also tweeted a response:

So, just to clarify for the people of the Southeast. You made a deal with the LPUK that in return for them admitting you, you would be given power?
There we have it. The people of the Southeast is represented by someone who sold his voters out for power, and refuses to call a by-election. Glad to know this is clear. Something New is the same old. (sic)

tommy1boys, Classical Liberal MP

In response, kwilson said he “wanted his baby back”. This raises the question of where the Libertarian MPs priorities lie, either with the people in Kent & the South East or the people of Northern Ireland.

In response to this question from the Telegraph, kwilson said:

I am elected to represent the people of the South East and i will be fighting for them for the duration of this term.

Then, at 10:25 PM, Vitiating revealed that a petition had been brought to his attention, accusing the MP for the South East of “opportunism”, Vitiate, however, called the petition “opporunisitic”.

The Telegraph has received a draft copy of the aformentioned petition from an anonymous source.

The draft petition calls for kwilson to resign, citing that he ran on a “centre left manifesto” and that he endorsed “radical left wing parties”.

Signatories include members of TLC parties, including the Leader of the TLC.

The Telegraph will keep this article updated as it receives more news.